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Bilirubin Test
Old red blood cells break down and release bilirubin as a byproduct. Once a red blood cell completes its life cycle, the liver breaks it down and sends it for processing via the bloodstream. Bile is the end result of the liver’s sorting of bilirubin and other waste products. The intestines are the path that bile takes out of your body. The pigment known as bilirubin is responsible for the characteristic yellow color of bile. It also colorizes your excrement.
What is a blood test for bilirubin?
With a bilirubin blood test, you can determine how much bilirubin is in your blood. Your doctor will take a tiny blood sample from your vein and send it off to the lab for analysis. To find out if your bilirubin levels are normal, the lab will measure them. When bilirubin levels are abnormally high or low, it could mean that the body isn’t properly breaking down and eliminating old red blood cells.
What does a blood bilirubin level mean?
When evaluating your liver health, your healthcare professional may order bilirubin testing. The bilirubin test is one of the many liver function tests that evaluate various liver products in your blood. If these readings are abnormally high or low, your liver may be struggling. However, elevated bilirubin levels may not necessarily point to a liver disease. It can sometimes be in a different location.
How can hyperbilirubinemia, or elevated bilirubin levels, come about?
Blood bilirubin levels could rise if:
Your body is breaking down red blood cells at an excessive rate. If you have a blood condition that causes the destruction of red blood cells, such as hemolytic anemia, you may be producing too much bilirubin.
The amount of bilirubin in your blood is too high for your liver to normally handle. There are a number of conditions that might impact your liver’s ability to operate normally, including toxic overload episodes or chronic liver disease.
Inefficient bile clearance occurs in your biliary system. A gallbladder or bile duct blockage may cause bile to back up and leak into your bloodstream.
What are the reasons behind hypobilirubinemia, or low bilirubin levels?
Medications for seizures, antibiotics, birth control, and sleep aids can all reduce bilirubin levels. Typically, low levels aren’t anything to be worried about.
How does the body use bilirubin?
Expiration of red blood cells results in the production of bilirubin. The usual route for elimination is through the digestive tract. However, once eliminated, it may prove beneficial. It may help prevent cardiovascular disease by acting as an antioxidant, according to new research. But it can be poisonous in excess. If it accumulates in the blood, it could induce nausea and vomiting. Because it irritates the nerves just under the skin, it can also cause itching.
How can a high bilirubin level manifest itself?
Jaundice, characterized by a yellowing of the skin and eyes, is the result of elevated bilirubin levels. In many cases, a healthcare provider will initially look for jaundice as a reason to examine your bilirubin levels. A darker urine color might be an indication of high bilirubin levels in the blood. Your poops may be lighter or clay-colored if the bilirubin isn’t passing out normally. High levels of bilirubin can cause itching, often known as pruritus.
For what reasons is a bilirubin blood test conducted?
In most cases, a healthcare provider will draw blood from an arm vein. For a few hours before the procedure, they may advise you to abstain from food and drink. They will use a hollow needle to extract a tiny sample and place it in a vial. When the needle inserts or withdraws from your body, you may experience a brief pain or prick. Doing this will take no more than a few minutes. We will then send the sample to a lab for analysis. We will return the results to you later.
If your infant shows signs of jaundice, a healthcare professional will monitor their bilirubin levels to make sure they are not excessively high. While jaundice in infants is harmless most of the time, it can be dangerous if the bilirubin levels are too high. Typically, doctors puncture a baby’s heel with a sterile lancet to collect blood samples. The “heel stick” is an established method of checking the health of infants.
How will I know what the results are, and what they imply?
The test results will allow you to see the bilirubin levels in your blood. Bilirubin enters your bloodstream in two distinct forms: one that travels to your liver for processing, and another that leaves your liver. Your test will display both of these numbers, along with your total bilirubin. Common units of measurement include milligrams of bilirubin per deciliter of blood (mg/dL).
We are comparing conjugated and unconjugated bilirubin, also known as direct and indirect bilirubin.
A word about the bilirubin that makes its way to your liver: it’s “unconjugated,” meaning it can’t dissolve in water. Your liver transports it by binding to albumin, a protein present in your blood. In order for bilirubin to become water-soluble, the liver separates it from albumin and links it to a sugar molecule. As a result, it can dissolve in bile and pass through the digestive tract.
Your liver processes bilirubin, resulting in “conjugated” bilirubin. Some test results refer to it as “direct” bilirubin. In a straightforward manner, we can quantify this type. Direct measurement of unconjugated bilirubin is not possible. We calculate it by dividing the total and conjugated blood bilirubin levels by the total blood bilirubin level. Your test results may refer to unconjugated bilirubin as “indirect” bilirubin.
What level of bilirubin raises red flags?
The range of values that are considered normal for bilirubin levels may vary slightly across laboratories. Adult and paediatric total bilirubin levels often fall within the normal range of 0.2 to 1.3 mg/dL. Your healthcare provider may decide to do additional tests to determine if your levels are higher. If your levels are higher, it could indicate a problem that needs to be addressed. However, therapy is typically not necessary for high bilirubin levels.
For infants, the situation is slightly different. Newborns typically have values between 1.0 and 12.0 mg/dL. Hyperbilirubinemia in infants is predictable and frequently self-limiting. Nonetheless, medical professionals closely monitor these patients to prevent dangerously high or low bilirubin levels. Besides harming the baby, this could indicate a more serious condition.
At what point does bilirubin become harmful?
When a new-born’s bilirubin level rises above 15 mg/dL within the first 48 hours or 20 mg/dL within 72 hours, medical professionals advise therapy. At these concentrations, there is more unconjugated bilirubin than albumin that can bind it. Unconjugated bilirubin poses a threat to infants’ growing brains because it can cross the blood-brain barrier. It can cause varying degrees of kernicterus, a form of brain injury.
Adults and children face different levels of this danger. Neither the brains of adults nor their levels of unconjugated bilirubin are nearly as susceptible to damage. Babies conjugate bilirubin considerably more slowly than adults, but they create it at a far quicker rate. Many other factors can cause conjugated hyperbilirubinemia in adults. While elevated bilirubin levels in adults may indicate a potentially life-threatening illness, the bilirubin itself poses no danger.
When bilirubin levels are high, what does it indicate?
If the rate at which your body breaks down red blood cells exceeds the capacity of your liver to process them, you may notice elevated levels of unconjugated (indirect) bilirubin. This could suggest:
- An illness that causes hemolysis…
- Dysplastic bowel syndrome.
- An adverse reaction to a blood transfusion occurs.
There are several causes of unconjugated bilirubinemia in infants:
- Delivery before the expected due date.
- The baby and the birthing parent have different blood types.
- Drug responses to lactating mothers’ milk.
Your body may elevate conjugated bilirubin (direct) levels if it is unable to eliminate it. Possible biliary or gallstone diseases could be the cause of this condition.
- Toxic gallstones.
- The gallbladder is inflamed.
I have cholangioitis.
Both forms of bilirubin can accumulate in dangerous amounts in the blood when your liver is unable to properly handle them.
A temporary stress on the liver, like a new medication or heavy alcohol consumption, could cause a rise in total bilirubin levels. There could also be indications of acute or chronic liver disease. Among these factors are:
- Mononucleosis and viral hepatitis are two examples of infection.
- Wilson disease, Crigler-Najjar syndrome, and Gilbert’s syndrome are all hereditary disorders that impact bilirubin metabolism.
- Adverse hepatitis can be caused by drugs or alcohol.
- Cirrhosis and chronic liver failure describe the liver’s condition.
What will happen if my test findings are out of the ordinary?
A medical professional will look over your medical history and current symptoms to determine what could be causing them. A variety of therapy options will be available for various causes. To assist in diagnosing your problem, they may recommend additional imaging or blood testing. Additionally, they may recheck your bilirubin levels to ensure they are not increasing. If your newborn’s bilirubin levels are too high, they may prescribe medication to lower them.
What treatment options are available for a newborn with an elevated bilirubin level?
The most common method for lowering bilirubin levels in infants is phototherapy. A healthcare professional will place your baby under a fluorescent white or blue light. In order for the body to eliminate the bilirubin without converting it in the liver, light aids in its breakdown into a water-soluble state. This prevents unconjugated bilirubin from exposing your newborn’s brain tissue.
What steps can you take to reduce your own bilirubin levels?
If you are able to effectively treat or manage the condition that is causing your bilirubin levels to rise, then your levels will decrease. What happens next is conditional. Curing or at least lessening its symptoms are two of the possibilities that your doctor will discuss with you. In general, a nutritious diet, no drugs or alcohol (even OTC medications), and regular exercise can lessen the load on your liver.
Exactly what is a urine bilirubin test?
A comprehensive urinalysis, which examines your urine’s composition through a battery of tests, may include a bilirubin urine test. This may be required as part of a routine physical. If a healthcare provider observes jaundice or dark-colored urine, they may opt to perform a bilirubin urine test. When levels of conjugated bilirubin are exceptionally high, the abnormal presence of bilirubin in urine (bilirubinuria) may occur.
A healthcare professional will present you with a little container to collect urine samples in order to do the test. To help you feel more comfortable peeing, they will provide you with a hygienic wipe. The marked container indicates the amount of urine to collect. To avoid contamination, gather your sample outside of the jar and then return it to your doctor. They’ll get it tested in a lab.
